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Sunday, January 13, 2013

OT: Yet more odds and ends -- The Cottage Cheese Trauma

I think I may have aroused some curiosity over the years with some of you, regarding my obsessive aversion to the evil substance known as cottage cheese. It's one thing to dislike a food; there are several foods I don't like. Beets, bell peppers, radishes, oatmeal, cheese (unless it's melted), avocados, pretty much all Indian food. But a special revulsion is reserved for cottage cheese, and it dates back to one of my earliest memories.

I was in nursery school (what they now call pre-school), so, what was I, about four years old? It was a sunny day and we were served our lunch outside. I don't remember what else was on my plate, but I remember that big blob of cottage cheese, paste-white and lumpy.

My parents didn't believe in making kids eat things they don't like, but they did have one rule. I couldn't just look at something and say, "I don't like that"; I had to taste it first. So I took a small bit on my fork, put it to my tongue, and immediately after I sensed the sour flavor and the coagulated texture, my throat closed. I put my fork down and looked at the teacher. "Do I have to eat this?" I asked. She nodded, her mouth full of her own nasty blob. She wouldn't let me leave the table until I'd eaten mine.

The other kids finished and went to play, and I sat there alone. I'd eaten everything else and now it was simply a showdown between me and this disgusting curdled stuff. I took a forkful and crammed it into my mouth... and then gagged so powerfully, I had to spit it back out or I would have lost the rest of my lunch. Then I started crying. There was no way I was going to be able to eat this.

Soooo... I used my four-year-old logic. If I couldn't make it disappear one way, I'd make it disappear another. Checking first to make sure no one was watching, I scraped the cottage cheese into my lap, hiding it in the folds of my skirt. Of course, that only worked until I stood up. Then the teacher saw the godawful mess I'd made, yelled at me and called my mother to come get me.

I didn't get in trouble for that with my mom. As I recall, I never went back to that nursery school and was shortly thereafter in a much nicer one.

To this day, I cannot stand the sight or even the sound of cottage cheese. I used to work for a boss who ate that crap every day for lunch, and my cubicle was near the kitchenette area. Just hearing his spoon go shhhlorrp into the cottage-cheese tub made my gorge rise. When cottage cheese commercials come on, I look away.

I don't care what you put in it. You can add bananas, pineapple chunks or peaches. You can add Reese's Peanut-Butter Cups for all I care. It's still revolting. Yes, I know it's good low-fat protein and it's a dieter's perfect food. I don't give a damn. If it were the last diet food on the planet, I'd simply say screw it, I'd been thin long enough, I'm tired of being freezing cold every winter anyway.

There you have it. Why I remember stuff like this in such excruciating detail, I don't know. I don't know anyone else who has a food trauma, either. Lucky me, huh?

29 comments:

  1. You're so lucky chocolate wasn't on the lunch menu that day. Imagine having a bad experience with chocolate as a tiny child:)

    Since I was surrounded by adult picky eaters, we never had food I didn't enjoy. It was all comfort food to me, with the exception of head cheese. My grandmother made it from pigs' feet; she was the only one who liked it. I would never go near that grey, jellylike block of stuff. To this day, I can honestly say I've never eaten it.

    Hugs,
    Hermione

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  2. Agree agree agree....however at my age when I grew up had we done that in school, we would have been spanked by the principal, sent home and most likely spanked again by mom!! Different era!

    Now also agree with your short list except oatmeal I can tolerate for it's nutritional and fiber value. However I love cheese!

    Nice post as usual.

    Always
    Ron

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  3. Since I enjoy all the foods you detest, I not be inviting you to our next progressive dinner.

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  4. I have a long list of foods that I just will not look at or attempt to eat. There are a lot of them that I have never even tried to eat. The rule in our house was you had to taste it. One small taste and you were finished. BUT what you put on your plate, you had to eat it. My problem is the foods I really love are all fatting. Does Feta cheese fall into the same bucket? I can take or leave cottage cheese. I have no desire to fix a meal for you but baked cottage cheese in a pasta dish it totally different than just a pile on your plate. If you eat Lasagna you might have had some and didn't know it. Hal

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  5. Erica,

    Had a similar experience at school. With cheese pie. Everytime we had it I used to scrap it into my hankerchief. I love cheese now but still can't eat cheese pie.

    Love,
    Ronnie
    xx

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  6. Don't order poutine in Quebec! (Google it.)

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  7. Hermione -- I've never eaten headcheese either. Just the name is gross!

    Ron -- most people love cheese. I'm an oddball, for sure.

    OBB -- I'll try to get over it. :-)

    Hal -- that very well may be; I know some who substitute it in lasagna for ricotta cheese. But when it's hidden like that, it's different. Sorry, but I don't like feta either.

    Ronnie -- you must have had a lot of ruined handkerchiefs! :-)

    Anonymous -- I've seen pictures of it! Gahhhh! Mighty fancy name for something so grotesque.

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    Replies
    1. Not odd at all....we all have our own tastes!
      Always
      Ron

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  8. I used to eat cottage cheese with jam in it. I loved it. I probably still would, but I am allergic to milk protein.

    The thing that literally nauseates me is any kind of yellow squash, ie, hubbard, acorn, banana, spaghetti, etc. Just the smell of it cooking makes me gag.

    I don't like most of the yellow veggies, including carrots, so I don't eat them. I used to hate yams, but I can eat them now if I add things to them.

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  9. Bobbie Jo -- funny how different we all are. I love squash, and I munch on carrots all the time. But yams? Blech.

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  10. Hi Erica -- Your teacher was VERY mean to want to make you eat the cottage cheese YUCK :-( I am glad that you were sent home and never went back to that school again.No one should be forced to eat something that they don't like.Everyone like's what they like,that's my story and i am sticking to it :-)UGH the ape eat's cottage cheese sometime's BLECH.I like macaroni & cheese :-)Much Love and hug's from naughty girl Jade

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  11. Jade -- it's a generational thing. A lot of kids used to be forced to clean their plates. It sucked.

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  12. I don't have any childhood trauma to explain why I can't stand cottage cheese. That stuff's just GROSS! LOL No other reason needed!

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  13. Erica, I myself am a picky eater. The foods that you don't seem to like is likewise with me. And I am certainly against forceing anyone to eat what they don't like. Especially when they are at a young age. I am beginning to understand, the complexity that you had to endure in your early life. Because liking, or disliking certain foods is an important part of each person's life. Foods I have always liked are Mcdonalds hamburbers, Nedicks hot dogs, pizza, English style Fish and chips. A good Pastrami Sandwich, icecream, hot chocolate, potato salad. To name just a few. As you can see I am a gourmet ? XXX luv ya.

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  14. Jen -- I figured my intense aversion required a bit more explanation! LOL

    Six -- I am a poor excuse for a Jew; I don't like pastrami. A good brisket sandwich, however, is fabulous. :-)

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    1. Erica, I'am with you on that 'brisket', plus a good kosher pickle, would round it off. "Ovey, and Tam" all the way. Would'nt you agree?

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    2. Yup! Brisket on rye, mustard, kosher half-sour pickle on the side. :-)

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  15. Unlike most Australians I abhor Vegemite. I got sick of my mother sending me off to school with axle grease sandwiches. There is also a tasteless pseudo meat called "devon", (I have heard that US baloney is similar) which used to be German Sausage until the anti-German names lunacy of World War I. If all of a pig is used and the lips and anuses are used for frankfurters, what do they use for devon?

    John

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  16. I actually know a few people who have really bad food memories and to this day won't eat the food related to it.

    I once got really sick and ended up throwing up for 2 days after going to Benihana's so I'll never go there again and think that's where my shellfish allergy may have been discovered.

    My grandpa was forced to eat onions as a young child. It was the depression and you damn well better eat what was put in front of you. It was the one thing he hated, he'll eat any other vegetable. He ate it and got really sick, ended up in the hospital. To this day, he better not find any onions in his food.

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  17. Your cottage cheese aversion is like mine to Swede and Turnips; with the exact same problem of being forced to eat it.

    Good fresh Feta is a delight to eat, especially when drizzled with extra virgin olive oil and sprinkled with oregano (best straight from the plant) as part of a Greek Salad.

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  18. John -- blech! I don't want to know! Vegemite and Marmite always seemed kind of gross to me, but I guess it's a cultural thing?

    Lea -- sounds like food poisoning! Ugh! I've never had that, and I consider myself very fortunate. Yeah, depression era... you ate what you had or you starved, period. My mother was a holdover from those times and she never wasted anything, not one morsel.

    TLB -- you know, I don't know if I've ever eaten turnips. Are they anything like parsnips?

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  19. Parsnips and swedes are turnips. Americans call swedes rutabagas.
    Usually you need one of each to make vegetable soup.

    John

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    1. John:
      I have to admit that it was a bit unnerving the first time I saw a recipe that called for the cook to "gut a swede".

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  20. Although I can't say that I share your aversion to cottage cheese I did take note that we both dislike oatmeal. In fact, my loathing of oatmeal was so well known in the family that my now late wife could and did hide her smaller size presents for me in an empty Quaker Oats canister, knowing with confidence that it would be the last item in the kitchen that I would be opening. But it is, by the way, the lima bean that I hold with the same contempt that you seem to have for cottage cheese.

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  21. John, parsnips are not turnips. Parsnips are, well, parsnips. They are related to carrots, look like white carrots but have a strong flavour.

    Turnips and rutabagas are two different vegetables from the cabbage family, but we Canadians call rutabagas turnips, while in some other countries they are called swedes. Turnips are small, mild-tasting and round like white beets, while rutabagas are quite large, strong-flavoured, orange, and are sold covered with wax.

    Hermione the horticulturalist

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  22. Sweetspot -- oatmeal, to me, is tan cottage cheese. Same deal with the additions -- I don't care what fruit or other goodies you put in there, it's still blech to me.

    Hermione -- wow! I'm impressed. OK, so I've never had a turnip or a rutabaga. I always thought rutabaga was a hilarious word, though.

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  23. Oh, Erica, if only I had known about the cottage cheese thing... I could have spend less buying you all that hollandaise sauce and tapioca pudding.

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  24. Danny -- you and your damned Hollandaise sauce. And tapioca pudding is nasty as well -- those disgusting gelatinous lumps! *gag*

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  25. Erica, just be grateful that you have never seen the process of harvesting the valuable tapioca globules, from those sickly mutant sea creatures... Oh, the horror.

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